The British Film Institute has announced that it will re-release theatrically director Stanley Kubrick's classic film 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). The film will open in theaters across the United Kingdom on November 28th, as part of the BFI's 2014 Science Fiction blockbuster project.

The BFI's Science Fiction Film blockbuster will be presented over three months (October - December 2014) with a historical and thematic exploration of the best of this perennially popular and visionary genre. The UK-wide release of 2001: A Space Odyssey, which will use a digital transfer provided by Warner Brothers, will be a highlight in a wide-ranging program to be revealed in full in July.

I know I will be viewed as a heretic but despite being a huge movie fan and a lover of SF, I've never got the love for this movie.

Sure the FX, production design and model work are incredible and the classical music is stunningly effective. But sorry, the film is DULL. The dawn of man sequence goes on far too long (and the ape costumes are totally unconvincing) and the rest of the movie never grips me either.

To be honest I've never really got into Kubrick generally. I always thought The Shining was incredibly over rated, ponderous, over acted and again poorly paced.

I know I will be viewed as a heretic but despite being a huge movie fan and a lover of SF, I've never got the love for this movie.

You’re not sounding heretical, you’re speaking for a lot of us.

Kubrick’s “2001” was a huge commercial success because it was hugely enigmatic. Millions loved trying to figure out the “profound” script, like what the monolith stood for; why Hal went dirty on us; and what the embryonic baby at the conclusion signified. Late 60s potheads will remember the movie’s expensive nincompoopery often became a party game: a fat take-home joint for the most creative analysis. Enjoyed for other reasons too: the staging was immense-looking (as opposed to being immense); things were comically, surpassingly spotless and tidy; there was a lulling cheekiness in using classical music to support the equally lulling ambiance; with the exception of the light show-head trip (with its nebulae and galaxies that could only be imagined before Hubble’s telescopic eye) and the poor replication of stars, the special effects and miniatures were intriguingly subdued and polished; and women got off in a big way on Gary Lockwood’s legs. Many of us criticized Kubrick for all this, for making a Super Panavision objet d’empty art, reaching its slumberous zenith in the French provincial bedroom with its largeness, paintings and lighted white floor. Kubrick and Arthur C. Clark joining imaginations to make a safe, spacey nothingness that in effect puts each other’s smarts — and ours — to sleep. But even the skeptics, after seeing the sequel “2010,” will thank them for not spelling things out. A one-man show written, produced, directed and photographed by Peter Hyams, its elucidation becomes a form of over-expressed tomfoolery. When God speaks, only Hyams is listening.

It's a great movie. It never drops it's guard and dramatic quality is uncompromised from first frame to last. There's been nothing like it before nor since it's debut. It remains a unique high watermark.

The statement it makes to me is that there is nowhere to run within this, our life. Moral responsibility and culpability for every action is inescapable. Complete and unlimited freedom does not exist. Even the Star Child is the servant to the higher controller - that much is made clear in all the Odyssey books. Paradoxically, without this information an audience is tempted to think the brat at the end has no-one to spank it. But there is always higher wisdom somewhere. And that begs the question; if there is wisdom with no other wisdom above it, is that highest wisdom a servant or a master?

Wrong. Stephen King doesn't know what he's talking about, and his stupid remark about THE SHINING is no analogy to 2001. King's own version of THE SHINING is nothing to brag about.

Ralph:Mike_J: I know I will be viewed as a heretic but despite being a huge movie fan and a lover of SF, I've never got the love for this movie.

You’re not sounding heretical, you’re speaking for a lot of us.

Kubrick’s “2001” was a huge commercial success because it was hugely enigmatic. Millions loved trying to figure out the “profound” script, like what the monolith stood for; why Hal went dirty on us; and what the embryonic baby at the conclusion signified. Late 60s potheads will remember the movie’s expensive nincompoopery often became a party game: a fat take-home joint for the most creative analysis. Enjoyed for other reasons too: the staging was immense-looking (as opposed to being immense); things were comically, surpassingly spotless and tidy; there was a lulling cheekiness in using classical music to support the equally lulling ambiance; with the exception of the light show-head trip (with its nebulae and galaxies that could only be imagined before Hubble’s telescopic eye) and the poor replication of stars, the special effects and miniatures were intriguingly subdued and polished; and women got off in a big way on Gary Lockwood’s legs. Many of us criticized Kubrick for all this, for making a Super Panavision objet d’empty art, reaching its slumberous zenith in the French provincial bedroom with its largeness, paintings and lighted white floor. Kubrick and Arthur C. Clark joining imaginations to make a safe, spacey nothingness that in effect puts each other’s smarts — and ours — to sleep. But even the skeptics, after seeing the sequel “2010,” will thank them for not spelling things out. A one-man show written, produced, directed and photographed by Peter Hyams, its elucidation becomes a form of over-expressed tomfoolery. When God speaks, only Hyams is listening.

Horsepucky. You just like to hear your own doublespeak. There is no sense in anything you said. The film's box-office, its impact on the film industry, its pervasive influence throughout culture, to say nothing of its influence on science-fiction, is a matter of record. The record disproves your nonsense.

I saw 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY when it first opened at the Capitol Theater in NYC in 1968. I've posted about it before. It was a profoundly moving experience to these young eyes at the time, and it rewarded repeated viewing over the years. It was innovative. The was no other film remotely like it in the history of movies. It was something everybody wanted to try but no one knew how to do -- to tell a story in purely visual terms. It engaged audiences with its dramatic story as well with its ideas, but it was the visual storytelling that piqued people's curiosity and fired up their imaginations. 2001 did that before its influence began to be felt in other movies and on other filmmakers. It's influence on the industry and in culture is the measure of its creative and artistic success. Before the era of home video arrived to trivialize movie experiences, 2001 was a milestone. It still is.

Some people don't get it or just aren't receptive to it. It's their loss and no reflection on the film.

Love it or hate it, I dread what will be written at the film's IMDb forum, after re-release, with today's viewing audience. The incompetence, incoherence, dumb-assery -- it's going to be painful. I think I won't read it.

Some people don't get it or just aren't receptive to it. It's their loss and no reflection on the film.

Exactly.

There's nothing so very enigmatic about the meanings and metaphors in '2001': what's exceptional is in how Kubrick realised them.

I reach a sort of breaking point when people keep implying that because THEY don't get it, it can't be got. It's a fair old mix of dystopia, Jung, symbolism that crosses many areas, the scientific, the personal, the collective, and the futuristic.

It's a great "science fiction" film. But I don't expect the average person to like it or get it. Today science fiction generally means intergalactic space battles.

Yeah, today we get a lot of sci-fi-action films, pretty much any Marvel picture is science/fantasy action, or any other comic book pretty much too. Adult type sci-fi opera pictures like 2001, or even 2010 are rare now. Even Star Trek, occasionally opera like, or at least about ideas, recently became sci-fi-actionized. The audience now wants it's entertainment spelled out, spoon fed, with glossy camera work, awe and wonder be damned. Early Star Trek looks much closer to 2001 now that the market is flooded with tread and retread comic book flash bang zoom.

Yep, this is what happens when the "masses" embrace a niche market. It changes, and usually not in a good way for the hardcore fans. I totally agree with you, Marvel (and DC) superhero films are more Sci Fi oriented than comic book capers.

Wrong. Stephen King doesn't know what he's talking about, and his stupid remark about THE SHINING is no analogy to 2001.

Wrong? You do realize opinions are subjective and not factual, right? There's no right or wrong about it. But you put it in bold so it must be true...

Some people don't get it or just aren't receptive to it. It's their loss and no reflection on the film.

Your inability to see opinions as valid, even when they don't align with yours, is your loss.

For me, the problem with 2001 was that "visual storytelling" of which you speak. I like to feel as if I'm experiencing the events along with the characters, not being kept at arm's length.

This is a huge case of two people seeing the same thing, understanding it, but not reacting to it in the same way. I can understand your experience upon first seeing it. A movie going event like that is once-in-a-lifetime, but it does not invalidate my perspective.

There are such things as facts, and your opinion of 2001 is ridiculous in the face of the facts. You are entitled to your opinion, of course, even though it's asinine and completely worthless. To pretend that the film is something other than it is or that it's impact and influence has not occurred or that millions of viewers have not enjoyed and respected it over the decades is delusional. Why don't you go back to school and take a class in Logic.

To call 2001 twaddle is fine. In fact, when compared to the mainstream of typified audio visual tomfoolery passing as entertainment it is only natural to question what is going on in the order of it's atypical gallery of imagery.

To properly absorb any film requires appropriate mental machinery to be fully engaged to absorb the story content and meet it on the existential plane in which it rests. 2001 requires higher comprehensional ability than most. It requires real mental stretching on initial exposure.

Unfortunately, when I first saw it with a friend in the local cinema as a re-issue years ago, I failed to get it. And in all honesty, any youngsters going out to see it on the big screen born outside my generation will also fail to get it. The worst thing is that unlike me, they won't be bothered. They'll just trip the way they do nowadays. I may be wrong, however, I suspect the current screenings will be for the likes of me.